Design for Cold.

I watched this video posted at Copenhagenize today, and it almost made me cry (I know, I get so sentimental about the strangest things). It makes me feel optimistic that there are experts out there talking about building spaces in a way that is holistic and smart.

Spaces, and subsequently cities that appeal to people are of massive importance to how our cities are going to look 5, 10, 20, and 50 years from today.

Everybody I talk to who lives in a new neighbourhood complains about how unfriendly it feels. It's not like when we were kids, where you would be sent off to play unsupervised and just be told to come home for dinner. People don't always introduce themselves and bring you rhubarb cake when you move in. Playing doesn't happen in the streets anymore, it happens in fenced off backyards or supervised playgrounds.

I think the same can be said for adults in every day urban spaces. Though I do think things are slowly changing, this video made me think about how imperative it is for different levels and stages of planning to communicate. It really doesn't make sense for one entity to do a building, and only later inquire about landscaping and traffic flow. I think that's one of the reasons a lot of spaces don't work. You don't see people out walking around because the spaces aren't inviting. I mean, you're going to be spending a lot of money anyway. Is it much more expensive to build things that make sense?

And the best thing of all is the presentation is about how to design specifically for nordic climates. Just because it's cold it doesn't mean spaces can't be designed to make people feel inspired, happy, and welcome.

Watch this. Very educational and incredibly interesting.

It makes me wish social change were so much faster.